Detroit Needs Help

Sorry, Dave Bing. Detroit needs a bailout. I wasn't in favor of the auto industry bailout, but perhaps it helped. Detroit is going to drown without assistance.

According to one columnist:

The inflexible nature of the city's situation should, by now, be obvious. Detroit spends way more than it takes in, and owes more -- in debts and pensions -- than it can hope to raise in my lifetime. And I expect to live for quite a while.

This is a sad saga of unmanaged decline that must be ended before the city's next chapter can begin.

As Detroit has hemorrhaged people and, with them, tax base, its leaders have failed to adjust the size and breadth of city government to match. They borrowed to pay off borrowing, and mortgaged the city's future several times over; the debt-to-net assets ratio is a mind-blowing 33:1. And they made promises to employees that have become unsustainable; some 22,000 municipal retirees draw checks and have health care through a city with only 10,000 current employees.

Detroit has the highest income and property taxes in the state, but it can't keep buses running on time, maintain public safety or even keep the lights on. The city is as upside down as any enterprise could be...

Snyder's plan is the first, to date, that would address the horrible fiscal imbalances and mismanagement that sustain those realities. It's the debut outline of a comprehensive way for the city to live within its means, and rededicate itself to its prime function: the delivery of services to its residents.

  It's not sustainable, Detroit. You need help, and it's evident you cannot help yourself.